1: "Going green" is a great marketing campaign.  Note that they started their organization in 2007, at a point where anti-global warming sentiment was quite high...

2: It's also a strategic move.  I talked about this a few months ago in a previous thread: it's easier to win a debate by proposing a counter-alternative that addresses your complaints about the opponent's proposal than by standing by the status quo.  Right now, the left has hijacked the global warming debate by claiming that they are the only agents that advocate a way to solve global warming, which means if there is a 1% risk of global warming causing global destruction, they'll probably win the debate.  Under the current debate, if a person buys that global warming is true (which is easy for someone to believe because most of the science is above the average person's head), then the only way to solve it is to vote Democrat.

Alternatively, USCAP made a strategic move: they essentially said "Okay, global warming could exist, it could be man made, and it could threaten us all.  However, just because global warming is real, it doesn't mean you should win the government.  It doesn't mean the left is the only political philosophy that can solve global warming.  Here's our free market proposal to fix it."

Frankly, you've just become polarized in the issue... unless you truly believe that there's no way the free market can solve environmental issues like global warming... at which point I would question why you believe what you believe...

Remember, on global warming, the conservative platform isn't necessarily against global warming being true (while that is a front of attack, if global warming actually was proven to be true, it wouldn't make liberalism any more valid).  Rather, the major front is the question of how to fix global warming.  Why can't a free market solution, such as investing in companies that research alternative energies, curb global warming?

3: Your own article says those businesses abandoned their climate change organization once the legislation in Congress started going too far to the left...

"House climate legislation and Senate proposals to date have disadvantaged the transportation sector and its consumers, left domestic refineries unfairly penalized versus international competition, and ignored the critical role that natural gas can play in reducing GHG emissions," ConocoPhillips Chairman and CEO Jim Mulva said in a statment. "We believe greater attention and resources need to be dedicated to reversing these missed opportunities, and our actions today are part of that effort. Addressing these issues will save thousands of American jobs, as well as create new ones."

The first paragraph says the companies are going to just work on their own efforts to protect the environment, including new technology development.  Honestly, that sounds like the 100% opposite of leftism: businesses leaving environmental protection to the free market... where's the problem?

Oh, and you forgot McDonald's!

> Key wrote:

> @ r3quim:

Actually the appendages when folded out made the animal look bigger, and if the wings had markings that say...looked like two giant eyes, may have been enough of a scare to predators that they might have not taken a chance to eat said winged animal.

So, non flying animals with apendages did not mean they were useless.  Some of todays current insect and animals have these characteristics.

Problem: If that were the case, the vast majority of flying species would retain the giant eye patterns to this day.  Once developed, there's not really a reason to remove those patterns (aside from the few species who thrive upon using their colors for camouflage purposes).

> xeno syndicated wrote:

> r3quim wrote,

"This only further proves my point: If evolution as we understand it were correct, it would require these creatures to have intermediary phases.  Those intermediary phases are usually more vulnerable than creatures not undertaking the evolutionary process for the very reason of the trait trying to be developed."

According to the theory of evolution, every species is always in an intermediary phase.

Agreed.  However, I'm making a distinction between small-scale evolutionary upgrades (a different color which helps an animal survive) and revolutionary leaps in evolution (the creation of a wing).  My argument is that the intermediate phase for creatures undergoing revolutionary leaps requires a phase of vulnerability in those creatures to develop the final desired form.  Most species are probably undergoing the first type of evolution, augmenting muscles, mental capacity, color, or other small traits.  These generally don't require more than a few genetic changes to happen, so evolution can take care of it quickly.

> Ehawk wrote:

> i'm making this claim assuming that, though useless appendages can slow down a species survival rate, thats what makes evolution so special.  would it be correct to say:

"a species with a low survival rate, may have a high birth rate? which would allow the species overall survival rate to be compensated..."

it is also my belief that there is more to the evolution puzzle that just life and death based on adaptive mutations over time.  I think that the "will to live" and "proliferation" are justification that life evolves as a result of competetive survival.  and many species have different weaknesses and strenths, the cycle of life.

1: There's no empirical or biological reason why some useless flapping appendage would be able to increase birth rates of a species as a whole.  If the only trait being tested between two subjects, A and B, is that A has a useless appendage which has nothing to do with the reproductive system, then your argument has very little footing to stand on.

2: If a trait does increase a species' vulnerability, then many of the species, including the first creatures of the species that were essential to the dawn of the species, would be extremely vulnerable to being killed before sexual maturity.

> Ehawk wrote:

> @ zarf,
response to #1:
it is my understanding that just as the birds may have had to slowly develop intermediate traits, they had land speed to help their genetics survive long enough through those phase. 

But that land speed is not unique to birds.  A creature could just as easily develop the trait of land speed, yet avoid those whole useless flapping appendages.  In that case, the resulting trait would surely be that the flapping idiot would die while the fast, non-flying creature would survive due to that weakness of useless flapping.

>also a bird-like creature with useless flaps may not survive now, but remember when this happend the predators had equally useless traits. 

No, it occurred while SOME of the creatures were undergoing those transitions.  If that was the case, then every fossil we see would include a bunch of dinosaurs with third eyes, semi-growing wings, and appendages we couldn't even identify today.  The fact that there is even one fossil in the universe, even assuming every other argument you have written, proves this false.

> response to #2:
the skeletal system has evolved and gotten stronger over time. it is my belief that during this"intermediate phase", the skeletal system was either too weak to retain enough calcium deposits for fossilization, or the bones could have been gobbled up by scavengers and dismembered, which can also ruin a fossil.  keep in mind small animals, to this day, do not have the bone mass to generate fossils to stand the test of time.  what makes you think an animal the size of a small rodent would have fossil remains 200k years after its death?

1: Your scavenger argument is a huge leap of faith.  It assumes that 100% of a particular species is eaten by scavengers.  It assumes millions of creatures of multiple species die in the exact same way throughout an entire planet and through over a billion years of history.  In contrast, there are dozens of different ways creatures can die prematurely in ways that both prevent scavengers and preserve the skeletal system, including methods that fossilize eggs.  The odds of this are infinitely small.

2: The "intermediate phase" isn't one step in the evolutionary cycle, like the pre-cambrian era or something.  Evolution is an ongoing process.  As such, it would require these intermediary species to perpetually exist, and to derive from species that did have those strong skeletal structures, such as trilobites, Triassic-era dinosaurs, etc.

3: Many evolutionary processes, such as flight, require strong bone structures as a prerequisite.

Question, Ehawk:

How do you address the problem in evolution of intermediary steps?

Sure, a bird growing wings will give it an advantage over a creature that doesn't have wings.  However, it's impossible for a creature to suddenly gain a wing out of nowhere, as it would require a massive, perfect alignment of DNA to create a wing instantly.  Instead, the wing would have to have developed as part of small, intermediary steps before a full fledged wing was developed.  Two problems:

1: Those intermediary steps are more likely to be harmful to a species than helpful.  A creature running around with two stubs on its back has extra areas of vulnerability to predators, and probably reduced aerodynamics for speed, at least while those wings are in the stub phases.  The same could be said for any number of evolutionary traits (the eye?  Who the hell wants two vulnerable blobs next to their brain?).
2: We don't see these intermediary steps in the fossil records.  Where the hell are they?

Research: Focus on construction initially.  You can reduce the cost and speed of your other buildings, letting you later divert research into resource science.  If anything, the new science area should only indicate that you need to take some planet space that otherwise would go into resource production and put it into RCs.  A 20% diversion of resource building to RCs may drastically increase your resource research, giving you a greater return on investment.

As for cash, don't even think about it.  If you're playing a race with an income bonus, you'll have too many race points taken out of key areas, such as ops, science, or even attack or speed bonus, for a limited gain.  Yes, the price of resources seems to be declining.  But you also have an increased production capacity to offset the lost income value.

> Chris_Balsz wrote:

> - The health care "reform" orders you to buy insurance from a for profit company or owe a tax penalty.  That's the first time in the history of the United States that Congress tried that.  Do you think it will be the last time?

Isn't auto insurance mandatory?  Or is that state-level?

> Ehawk wrote:

> instead of stating that i never trust wikipedia, i should have said that i dont trust any religious information

Fair enough.  Now check the links, both provided by myself and avogadro.  In this particular case, saying "Jesus existed" isn't saying "Jesus is God."  All I'm arguing here is that there was a person who lived on Earth named Jesus, and that the person who we acclaim to be Jesus is based on that person.  Look, this debate has been hashed out by REAL historians over and over, and the conclusions based on historical literature from both Christian and non-Christian writers says there was a religious leader named Jesus who rose up in Israel around that time, and was crucified.  Avogadro posted a good link, and my Wikipedia article has some links to a couple books (note: books, meaning I can't post them online) on the subject.

> and yes my arguement is due to lack of evidence.  As a human being, i retain the right to trust the information or not, this is my right.  our species history has alot to be ashamed of, and frankly i find it funny that many people dont trust the news and yet, trust information that has been handed from generation to generation and even perhaps modified to serve purpose to power.  all of your citings and website will not make a difference, because i can do the same thing with evolution and avogado will just say the evidence was fabricated to serve the purpose of making evolution true. 

So your argument is based on absolutely nothing but mindless speculation and inherent mistrust of Christianity.  If that's the case, I think we're done here.

> and most of all humans didn't "all of a sudden get decietful" this has been going on for millenia...  the same people that give your so called evidence are only human just like the people that created your bible.

Check out Tallus in Avogadro's post.  Secular.  Now give me an explanation as to why Tallus would write an article saying the sky darkened when Jesus was crucified, but that was only because there was an eclipse, it had nothing to do with Jesus if, in fact, he knew Jesus had never existed or been executed in the first place?

> besides, dont you think IF jesus ever exsisted, the telephone theory may have made the story more incredable every time it was told? dont you think there is a possability that if we when into a time machine, the man the story was reference to, was just a man? place on a pedistel for the purpose of organized religion?

Not my argument.  Look, I'm not here arguing that Jesus walked on water, healed the sick, etc.  Your claim was an outright statement that the person of Jesus never existed in the first place, which both myself and avo have shown evidence to the contrary, from both Christians and non-Christians.

> i'm not knocking your beliefs dude, i'm simply stating mine.  now i know why you piss of fokker so much, you cant just let people express their beliefs, yours is right and everyones is wrong, jeez i can be thankfull that i dont live during the roman empire days, i would have been placed in a bronze bull!

Strike 1.

Oh, and I wanted to get back to one other thing:

You claimed that Mohammad also didn't exist and was probably a fabrication.  If that's the case, how would you explain the Shiite-Sunni split?

Arguing whether Jesus existed or not is one thing.  Claiming Mohammad didn't exist, however, is a hugely different story, as there is massive amounts of geopolitical change created at the time by the actual person of Mohammad at the time of his living.  It would be like saying George Washington didn't exist because you never saw him.